Democracy, Counterinsurgency, and Human Rights: The Case of Peru

Abstract

The wave of authoritarianism that swept over Latin America in the 1960s and 1970s focused international attention on the human rights violations committed by military dictatorships. As most Latin American nations experienced transitions to democratic rule in the 1980s, hopes were raised that human rights would be more widely respected. Nevertheless, it is questionable whether a regime change from dictatorship to democracy necessarily entails renewed respect for human rights. Does redemocratization represent a fundamental change in the exercise of political authority-that is, in relations between the state and civil society-or are there conditions under which democratic institutions and constitutional norms may fail to safeguard basic human rights? In Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, and Chile, human rights concerns under newly established democratic regimes have been dominated by the issue of military accountability for the abuses committed under previous authoritarian rule. Although these new democratic regimes have confronted serious obstacles to the prosecution of military officers for past human rights abuses, they have significantly improved the contemporary human rights conditions in their respective nations. In contrast, in Peru there has been a sharp upsurge in the level of human rights violations since the transition from authoritarian to democratic rule in 1980. These violations have been associated with a counterinsurgency campaign launched by the democratic regime against the revolutionary movement Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path), which initiated guerrilla operations in the midst of the regime transition in 1980.